Inclusions and exclusions in India’s forest governance

Thirty years ago, when a landlord approached the Supreme Court decrying deforestation in the Nilgiris Hills, little did he know that his petition would deeply entrench the role of judiciary in forest governance.

- Budhaditya Das Nikita Samarnath

Since then, the Court has delivered orders and judgments in the continuing case of TN Godavar- ’man Thirumulpad v. Union of India and has shaped India’s forest policy. Responding to interlocutory applications, the Court has made decisions with respect to timber trade, operation of saw mills and the functioning of national parks. It also created the Central Empowered Committee (CEC) to monitor the implementation of forest-related orders, and decided the price of forests and rules for compensatory afforestation. Godavarman orders have expanded the role of the State, especially the Centre, in forest conservation.

However, forest-dwelling people are equally important stakeholders. Their land rights and participation in decision-making on forest management are key to successful conservation. It is in this context that two recent judgments of the apex court in the Godavarman case (In Re: Aman Singh, December 18, 2024;and In Re: Zudpi Jungle Lands, May 22, 2025) offer compelling insights into the evolving direction of forest governance. In both cases, the Court considered the question of protecting landscapes that are not usually imagined as forests— grasslands known as Oransin Rajasthan and uncultivated grazing and scrub landsin Vidarbha, Maharashtra known as Zudpi lands. Orans, historically protected by agro-pastoral communities, are now threatened by renewable energy projects in the Thar desert. In the case of

Zudpi lands, whether they are a forest at all has been a matter of conflict between the state of Maharashtra and the Centre for several decades.

The question of what isa forest has been inextricably linked to the question of who owns and who should govern forests. The colonial State saw vast uncultivated landscapes as a source of valuable timber and reserved them as State-owned forests in the 19th century.